


hold on to let go

by djhedy, fuzzballsheltiepants, moonix



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - After College/University, Alternate Universe - No Exy (All For The Game), College Friends, Friends to Lovers, Light Angst, M/M, Undiagnosed Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-17 10:00:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29839812
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/djhedy/pseuds/djhedy, https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzballsheltiepants/pseuds/fuzzballsheltiepants, https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonix/pseuds/moonix
Summary: Five times Andrew and Neil reunite in the wrong place at the wrong time, and one time everything is just right.
Relationships: Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Comments: 194
Kudos: 526





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FoxsoulCourt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FoxsoulCourt/gifts).



> This fic is a birthday gift from the 3 of us to the always amazing Foxsoulcourt. Happy birthday, Cory, and thank you for your unflagging kindness, support, and discussions of tea and cats! You are a gift to the fandom, and deserve a present of your own.
> 
> Chapters will post every other day.

Andrew balled up his apron and tossed it over his shoulder into the hamper tucked in the corner of the back room. It landed right in the center, and Ángel raised his arms in silent celebration. He had given up on the whole “fist-bump” thing about five months ago, finally, but the apron throw had become their own tiny tradition. It was stupid and boring and Andrew didn’t know why he still did it at the end of every single shift.

He never missed. Maybe one day he would, just because, just to see what Ángel would do.

The coffee shop was chaotic in the afternoon rush, and he squared his shoulders as he faced down the gauntlet of haggard interns and caffeine-starved nurses, visitors with balloons and parents holding the hands of squirming children. It was always the same. The exact faces changed from day to day, but it was always the same.

The line parted around him, reforming like sheep after the dog runs through. The door slid open, and he found himself out on the street, blinking against the icy drizzle that stung his face. He loathed this dingy end of winter, everything the same shade of gray, the cold heavy enough to sink into his bones. It was supposedly warmer this week, but the thermometer lied. Andrew’s sluggish bloodstream told the truth.

He had four hours. Four hours to eat, nap, and then come back here to pick up Aaron before heading to his night shift at the library. Scrubbing a hand over his face, he turned towards the parking garage.

“Andrew?”

Andrew nearly stumbled off the curb at the call of his name. He knew that voice. Had committed it to memory years ago, the roundness of it, the warmth with which it cradled its vowels. But it didn’t belong here, in the gloom and the rain; it belonged to the sun.

He turned anyway. Neil Josten was there, the fine droplets clinging to his hair, looking exactly the same as he had three years ago on a dorm rooftop. Maybe not exactly the same. He had filled out a little; there was an easier curve to his lips, and the desperate restlessness in his eyes had quieted. Not disappeared, Andrew realized as he got closer, but it was no longer crashing against reality like waves against rocks.

A corner of Neil’s mouth twisted up in a smile. “I thought that was you,” he said. “You going to grad school here?”

Andrew shook his head. “Working.” He didn’t want to explain, but Neil accepted it with an easy nod.

They stared at each other for a moment. Neil glanced at his watch, then up at the building in front of them. “Look, I have like….an hour and thirteen minutes before I have to be in that building. Wanna grab something to eat? I think I passed a café back there, next to the hospital.”

Andrew hesitated. He didn’t know what the assholes he worked with would do if he showed up there with someone, let alone someone like Neil. There was a Subway around the corner, and a McDonald’s across the street, but Neil was already turning towards the café, tossing another crooked smile over his shoulder, and Andrew bit down on the inside of his lip and followed.

Neil inserted himself into line behind an intern who clearly wished he was dead and someone holding a teddy bear and an overlarge flower bouquet. Andrew watched him staring up at the huge chalkboard menu that hung over the espresso machines, his lips moving silently as he studied the options. There was something liminal about it, like three years hadn’t passed, like they were at the coffee shop on campus five hundred miles away. Neil had always studied the menu as earnestly as if they hadn’t eaten there every week for two years, and always ordered the same thing anyway. Chicken salad on whole wheat, no lettuce or tomato, and an almond milk cappuccino.

The line shuffled forward, and Neil turned to Andrew as they reached the bend before the counter. “How’s your brother?” he asked, leaning against the wall. “Still an asshole?”

Andrew nodded solemnly. “Of course. There’s nothing he can do about it, it’s genetic. Incurable. He doesn’t like to talk about it.”

“You’re identical twins.”

“Yep.”

Neil’s laugh was bright and sharp, cutting through the steady hum of low voices around them, the whir of the machines. Amy was manning the register, and she looked up at the sound, eyes going very round when she caught sight of Andrew with a guy who was clearly many miles out of his league. Andrew gave a tiny shake of his head, and she turned back to the woman in front of her, a grin playing in the corners of her mouth.

They had never been afraid enough of him here.

“You dropped out of the group chat.”

It wasn’t a question; it also wasn’t news. Andrew had deleted it shortly after graduation, when he’d moved up to this miserable city that always smelled like fish, even miles from the harbor. It wasn’t that far from where they had all met, yet it was a planet apart.

“Do you still talk to anybody?” Neil asked, as the person with the teddy bear fumbled their credit card into the tip jar. “From PSU, I mean.”

“Renee.”

Something flashed across Neil’s eyes, but it was gone before Andrew could identify it. He inched closer, his shoulder bumping against Neil’s as the intern rattled off their order to Amy. Neil jolted, and Andrew started to lean back, but Neil twisted to mutter in his ear, “Did that guy just order seven espresso shots in a mocha?”

“Probably.”

Neil shook his head in disbelief. “Well, if his heart explodes at least he’s already at a hospital.”

Part of Andrew wanted to tell him that that wasn’t even the weirdest order he’d seen that week, but the words died on his lips. He didn’t know why. Just like he didn’t know why he stopped talking to everyone from their strange hodgepodge group a few months after graduation. Except Renee, but that was more because she just kept talking to him whether he reciprocated or not.

Neil ordered—whole wheat chicken salad, nothing on it, and an almond milk cappuccino. Andrew almost snorted.

“Shut up,” Neil said, stepping on his foot, that damned crooked smile dangling from his mouth. “Order.”

Zach gave Andrew a suggestive eyebrow waggle when they reached that end of the counter to wait; Neil was watching teddy bear person juggling their possessions, so Andrew flashed a middle finger in Zach’s direction. Zach’s eyebrow waggle got somehow more pronounced, but for once he kept his fucking mouth shut.

He never ate in the café proper. It felt almost surreal sitting at one of the tables he had wiped down not an hour before, Neil at his left because Neil always sat at his left. Like he had walked out the door at the end of his shift and into a parallel universe.

“Aaron’s in med school, right?” Neil asked, taking his sandwich apart to inspect it for rogue vegetables.

“Unfortunately.” Neil made an amused noise as he chewed. “I asked him if he knew how to suture stab wounds. That was the only thing that got him to shut up about necrotizing pancreatitis last week.”

“What’s necrotizing pancreatitis?”

Andrew shrugged. “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask Aaron.”

It was a lie. He knew far more about it than he wanted to. At this point he was reasonably certain he could sit for boards and pass. But it was worth it to earn the laugh he’d known would come.

They ate in easy silence for a few moments. Neil looked contemplative, staring out at the slowly dwindling line without seeing any of the people in it. A thousand questions bubbled up out of Andrew’s throat, only to drift away and burst unspoken in the air. _Why are you here_ , and _what have you been doing_ , and _who are you now, are you still the same person who watched the stars on the rooftop with me?_ And then, _do you miss it?_ _Do you miss_ me _?_ But that one was too heavy and Andrew swallowed it down, where it expanded in his stomach until he found it hard to eat.

“Remember that night that everyone got so drunk, and Allison almost fell off the roof?” Neil asked. There was something soft and fond in the crinkles next to his eyes, and Andrew clenched his fist in his lap to keep from reaching out to touch it. “Renee saved her.”

“I wasn’t drunk.”

“Me neither,” Neil said.

But that bit wasn’t true. Andrew remembered, because of course he remembered. Neil, loose-limbed and pliant with alcohol, the ghosts in his eyes blurred into a hazy sort of peace. Leaning against Andrew, face tucked into the crook of his neck, warm and solid and trusting. They had talked about nothing and everything that night, while the others laughed and flirted and teased each other on the other end of the roof. It had been too cloudy to see the stars, so Neil had made up stories instead, about where the stars and the moon went when they weren’t visible, the adventures they found out in the blackness of space.

That was when Andrew had told him what he hadn’t told anyone else. About impossible dreams. About law school, and advocacy, and all the things he would never be and never do. And Neil had looked at him and believed, and for that moment, that hour, Andrew had almost believed too.

But Allison had nearly fallen off the roof, and everyone had sobered up from the shock. Neil had left Andrew to go comfort his friend, and Andrew had watched from the fringe of it all, where he had always been, always belonged.

A few weeks later they were all in different states, and Andrew deleted whatsapp from his phone.

“Why are you here?”

It sounded worse in the air than it had in his head. Neil gave him an amused shrug. “I applied for a PhD. They invited some of us here to see the campus, meet possible advisors, whatever.”

There was a tiny wisp of something like interest curling through Andrew’s chest, fragile and unfamiliar. “You’re doing your PhD here?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” But Neil didn’t meet his eyes, and Andrew knew he had already made his choice to be somewhere else.

They talked of other things. Neil caught Andrew up on the gossip. Kevin had gotten a dog, a rescue Labrador/pit bull mix named Flynn, and immediately set out trying to convince everyone else to also get dogs. Matt and Dan were engaged, which apparently was considered reasonably normal for people in their mid-20s but which Neil agreed felt like something that only happened on bad sitcoms. Jeremy had gotten into a car accident, nearly died, and then gotten a tattoo on his pec that said _Too Dumb To Die_.

It felt like a blink and their hour was over. Neil gathered up his trash, hovering awkwardly over the table and looking down at Andrew with a complicated expression on his face. “Andrew,” he said, and cleared his throat, twisting his napkin around and around in his fingers. “I—it was good to see you.”

Andrew nodded, though whatever it was that was rattling around in his chest right now was not something he would typically call good. “Don’t get hit by a bus crossing the street.”

That one corner of Neil’s mouth quirked up. “Why would a bus be crossing the street?”

And then he was gone. Again. Andrew sat there watching him disappear into the gray city, taking whatever little bit of brightness there was with him.


	2. Chapter 2

Neil’s breath puffed up in front of his face like an angry cat as he rang the doorbell and waited.

It was cold. Obscenely so. The kind of cold that touched you in inappropriate places, twisted your limbs until they ached.

It was also late. Neil pulled his phone out with stiff fingers to check the time and was just about to give up and find somewhere else to stay the night—anywhere but getting back in the car and driving home—when the speaker came to life with a crackle and a curt, irritated, “What.”

The familiarity of the voice doused him like a bucket of ice water. It was flat and expressionless, but Neil had teased out the nuances of it over the years, back when he still got to hear it almost every day. Or maybe he was just fooling himself, and he didn’t actually know it at all anymore.

“Hi,” he said, through chattering teeth. “I… it’s Neil.”

There was silence, and the old urge to run away flared up in Neil so suddenly that he nearly staggered under its weight.

“Uh, you know what, never mind,” he mumbled, “this was a stupid idea. I’ll just… go.”

The door buzzed at the same moment. Neil’s body made the decision for him, pushing forward and through, into a stale, claustrophobic staircase that smelled like day-old cooked cabbage and wet dog. He had to double back to check what floor Andrew was on, then jogged up the stairs, past identically grim hallways lined with dusty brown rugs, melted sludge and grit trodden deep into the fibers.

Andrew’s door was cracked open like an egg, a thick, shiny glob of light bulging from the gap. Neil gave it a cursory knock before stepping inside and closing it behind him, hesitating on the doormat as the snow slipped from his boots.

The apartment was shoebox-sized. There was only one room, crammed with a lofted bed, a desk, a dresser and a couch. The only bookshelf was overflowing, its contents stacked on the floor around it. To the right was a door, ajar, leading to a shudderingly plastic-pink bathroom that had probably been outdated before it was even built. Immediately to the left was a small kitchenette where Andrew stood chopping vegetables, looking somehow exactly like always and different at the same time.

Neil pried his dry lips apart, but didn’t know what to say beyond, “Hi.”

Andrew finished tossing something into a plastic bowl and finally turned to him. He looked wan and tired in the light from the buzzy bright lamps under the kitchen counters. His hair was longer than the last time Neil had seen him, less styled—but then, it was late, and Neil had just shown up on his doorstep out of the blue.

“Renee gave me your address,” he said. Andrew nodded like he already knew—come to think of it, Renee had probably warned him—and wiped his hands on a crumpled dish towel.

“Not exactly a five-star hotel,” he said, his voice low and gravelly and _tired_. He tossed the towel down and gestured around the room. “Well, make yourself at home.”

“I won’t trouble you for long,” Neil felt the need to point out, and finally bent down to take off his boots. Andrew continued to putter around the kitchen area and Neil slipped out of his damp jacket, rolling his shoulders with a sigh. “It’s fucking freezing outside.”

Andrew made a soft grunt and whisked something in a mug. Neil stepped into the living area, inspecting the piles of books, the empty coffee cup on the desk, the star chart taped up on the ceiling above the bed. His stomach gave an almost-painful tug at that last one.

“Still gazing at stars?” he joked. There was the controlled snap of a cupboard door being shut with force, and then Andrew carried the bowl and a bottle of water over to the minuscule coffee table wedged between the couch and the bookcase.

“What are you doing here?” he asked Neil, and Neil ran his fingers over the dust on the dresser and tried to find an answer to that.

“Had some stuff to sort out,” he said at last, keeping it vague.

Andrew picked up two bowls, two spoons and two glasses and brought them over, sinking into the couch that had a noticeable dip in the middle and threadbare patches on the armrests.

“I meant, what are you running from?”

Neil froze. Then he huffed out a not-quite-real laugh and joined Andrew on the couch.

“That obvious?”

“Always.”

“Huh. My girlfriend, I guess,” Neil said, sheepishly. He wasn’t really _running from her_ , just. He didn’t particularly want to talk to her about the fact that his visa had come through, because he knew what she was going to say, because he didn’t want to cycle through the same old arguments again.

They both knew their relationship wouldn’t survive the distance.

But he was starting to realize that maybe it also wouldn’t survive Neil staying.

“Is that fruit?” he said, peering into the bowl.

Andrew didn’t reply. He filled their bowls with generous helpings of salad, which didn’t have any vegetables in it at all, just mâche lettuce studded with purple grapes, creamy persimmons and walnuts, drizzled in a mustardy dressing. He topped off the bowls with a few of the cream cheese and cranberry balls that Renee used to make for parties and gatherings and which had been so popular that no matter how many she made, they’d always be gone by the end of the night.

“I didn’t know you could cook,” Neil joked, accepting his bowl. The first bite was crisp, tangy and fruity all at once, a little explosion of sunshine on his tongue. “Oh. This is amazing.”

“Making a salad is hardly cooking,” Andrew said, poking at his own portion without really eating.

“What are the little black bits?”

“Poppyseed.”

Neil crammed another forkful in his mouth.

“The cream cheese balls taste different,” he noticed. They were tangier, less buttery sweet than Renee made them.

“Goat’s cheese,” Andrew supplied.

Neil hummed, trying to make himself chew more slowly so it would last longer.

“How long have you lived here?” he asked, flicking his fork around at the sad-looking room. The plaster was peeling from the walls, and the television in the apartment upstairs was loud enough that Neil could tell what show they were watching.

“A while.”

“So, no law school then?” Neil asked tentatively.

“No,” Andrew said.

Neil was used to him being a reticent asshole. It had been one of the things that had drawn them to each other in the beginning—neither of them being very interested in small talk or empty pleasantries. But there was something heavy about the way Andrew answered, like every word had to be meticulously shaved off a large weight. The light caught on a yellowing bruise on Andrew’s jaw as he chewed a slice of persimmon, and Neil had to stop himself from reaching out and tracing it.

He wanted to ask if Andrew was okay, but he didn’t feel like he had the right to that information, somehow. So he didn’t.

Instead he said, “I think I want to go back to Europe.”

Andrew’s hand stilled, fingers tensing around the dull, tarnished handle of his spoon.

After a moment, Andrew let go of it and took a sip of his water.

“And what is stopping you?” he asked once he’d swallowed. Neil looked away from where he’d watched the muscles of his throat moving, and down at the dregs of his salad.

“I don’t know,” he said. “People, I guess. Unfinished business.”

“Then finish it. If that’s what you want.”

It sounded like a challenge, though Neil couldn’t figure out for what exactly.

“Right,” he said weakly, and finally Andrew was looking at him, and Neil found he couldn’t look away.

The world grew a little duller, a little quieter around them. Neil felt his own pulse in his throat, the sweat-damp fabric of his shirt in his armpits, the dryness of his fingertips. It had always been like this between them. Everything narrowing down to the two of them.

Unfinished business.

Was that why he was here? Because he and Andrew were unfinished, somehow?

His phone buzzed in his pocket, breaking the spell.

He put his bowl on the table and wrangled it out, blinking at the message and the time that was ticking down inexorably.

“Your girlfriend?” Andrew asked off-handedly, gathering up their dishes.

“Hm?”

Neil remembered too late that he’d wanted to finish his last bites of salad, but Andrew had already scraped the leftovers into the bin and piled the bowls into the sink.

Then Andrew paused, back to Neil, and said, “Stay the night.”

Neil couldn’t figure out if it was an offer or a question or a statement. There was no space for another bed or mattress anywhere, and the couch would probably be hell on his back. He’d have to get up hideously early tomorrow morning to make it back in time and would likely wake Andrew up in the process, unless he’d stopped being a light sleeper sometime in the last few years.

It had been so long since Neil had last slept in the same room as Andrew, listening to his steady breathing in the dark.

He opened his mouth to say no, but what came out instead was, “Yes. Okay.”


	3. Chapter 3

After dessert and more speeches and more dancing, the day was finally starting to wind down.

Andrew piled another one of the tiny plates with leftover chocolate mousse, raspberry tiramisu and the last mini blueberry tartlet and retreated back to the corner he’d claimed as soon as he arrived. Aaron was lost to the clusters of conversation, Nicky and Erik were still slow-dancing amid fallen streamers, stray balloons and glittery swathes of confetti. He caught Neil’s eye—they’d been staying in each other’s orbit all day, circling and intersecting, a barely noticeable dance of their own. Now, Neil detached himself from the never-ending parade of Klose cousins and made a beeline for Andrew, so full of intent it sent a thrill down Andrew’s spine.

“Hey,” he said, throwing himself into the chair next to Andrew’s. His fingers came up to loosen his tie even further—Andrew had theories on when it was going to just come off entirely—and Andrew had to force himself to look away from the way the tendon in his throat strained as he tipped his head back. “Na, hast du Spaß?”

Andrew’s overheated brain took a moment to parse the words as German.

“Fun is not what I came here for,” he replied, too tired to juggle German grammar right now.

“No?” Neil grinned, switching back to English as well. He was in his element here, moving among the native speakers, picking up new slang and polishing his accent until it was shiny and smooth. “What did you come for then?”

Andrew lifted his plate in reply and scraped another spoonful of tiramisu into his mouth.

“Of course,” Neil nodded. “Must be one hell of a spread if you flew halfway across the world for it.”

“Exquisite,” Andrew said deadpan, looking right at Neil, but Neil only laughed.

He was, though. Exquisite. Flushed and slightly sweaty and brimming with life, his sun-bleached hair mussed and sticky-uppy where it had only half-dried after he’d jumped into the nearby river with some of the Klose cousins. He looked healthier than the last time Andrew had seen him. Fresh and crisp, like someone had just taken him out of the fridge.

Europe had changed him. Made him both younger and older. And while Andrew hadn’t come to Nicky’s wedding for Neil, the fact that he’d stuck it out quite this long…

Well.

Suffice it to say it wasn’t just the dessert buffet that had given him an incentive not to disappear straight after the ceremony.

“Can I try the raspberry stuff?” Neil asked, scrunching up his nose a little. His skin was saturated with late summer freckles and he’d lost his suit jacket somewhere along the way. His light button-down shirt had barely-there pinstripes woven into the fabric, making him look streamlined and angular. Andrew wanted to run his hands over them, tease against the grain of the pattern.

He scooped some of the tiramisu onto his spoon, careful to get one of the raspberries that had decorated the top, and offered it to Neil. Watched as his smiling mouth welcomed the spoon, pursed briefly around it and popped off, a dusting of cocoa now lining the seam of his lips.

“It’s good. Not as sweet as I expected,” he said through a mouthful of melting cream.

Andrew was once again caught up in that liminal feeling where the moment he was experiencing seemed to fan out like a handful of cards, tempting him to think this could be more than it was. That they could sit together at the fringes of every social gathering like they’d used to back in college, sharing bites of food and gossip and marking out their space as separate from the rest.

But Neil lived in France and worked in Luxembourg and regularly commuted to Paris and London and Berlin, and Andrew would get back on a plane at the end of the week and return to his unpaid bills and his dying houseplants and his nicotine patches, and a cat who preferred old Mrs. Jones down the hall.

They finished the plate together in silence. Neil ate the last blueberry tartlet all by himself, but Andrew didn’t even mind. Then Neil stretched, yawned, and stood up, and for a heart-stopping moment Andrew expected him to say he was calling it a night.

Instead he said, “I’m gonna get some fresh air,” like an invitation, and Andrew heaved himself to his feet and followed him outside.

The night was still warm, though laced with a faint, pepperminty swirl of chill that hinted at the coming change of season. They wandered past the pavilion and the firepit, down to where the river was a gleaming gift ribbon curling around the trees. They could still hear the faint music spilling from inside, something slow and soulful after the band had finished their set of well-known covers and excitable dance songs. The singer was another one of Erik’s many cousins, and Nicky had made a pointed comment in Andrew’s vicinity that he was gay and single before disappearing to dance. Andrew had entertained a brief fantasy of pulling him away during break to hook up in one of the storage rooms or behind the barn, but the idea had dispelled like morning mist at Neil’s arrival.

Neil crouched down to swipe his sticky hands through the water and hummed.

“It’s still really warm,” he said.

“No,” Andrew said.

Neil twisted his head to look at him, wide-eyed and innocent, his bent knees splayed out artfully on either side. His heels remained on the ground despite the position—he’d always been obscenely flexible.

“But,” he said, soft and cajoling. “Andrew.”

“Nicky will never forgive me if you drown at his wedding.”

“Well, you know what to do then, don’t you?”

“Tie you up?” Andrew suggested, then bit his tongue in punishment for that.

Neil’s mouth teased at a smile.

“Come swim with me,” he said. “You can make sure I don’t do anything stupid, and I promise I won’t get your hair wet.”

“I don’t care about my hair getting wet.”

“Oh, good. So there’s nothing keeping you from going in.”

He was already unbuttoning his shirt. The tie came off at last, and Andrew’s stomach gave a little lurch.

He took off his own jacket and Neil smirked, sending another jolt through his guts. Moonlight bobbed on the water and shivered cautiously over Neil’s skin as he stepped out of his pants and into the river, and Andrew had no choice but to follow.

There was an initial shock of cold before his body got used to it. Neil had thrown himself right in and was swimming against the current, determined enough not to be swept downstream but lazily enough that he didn’t make any progress in the other direction either. Andrew stayed where his feet could reach, splashing aimlessly, watching Neil wrestle with the current.

Being this exposed, naked with another person, out in the open with people close enough he could still make out their voices—it should have felt unsafe. But Andrew had never felt unsafe with Neil, and so he didn’t now.

When Neil had tired himself out, they drifted back to the water’s edge, crouching in the shallows and gazing at the stars.

They looked the same as back home, the same as all those years ago, yet somehow so, so different.

“See?” Neil murmured. “Didn’t drown.”

“There’s still time,” Andrew pointed out. “People have drowned in less.”

Neil hummed.

“You’d pull me out.”

“Would I?”

“You said it yourself. Nicky would never forgive you if you let me die on his wedding day.”

Andrew splashed a little water at him. Neil splashed some back. It was forceful enough to reach his head and Andrew jerked back reflexively, and Neil made a triumphant sound.

“Thought you didn’t care about getting your hair wet?”

Andrew scowled at him and resisted the urge to fiddle with it. He’d styled it _just right_ this morning, and he hadn’t spent all day successfully avoiding hair ruffling attempts by the many-limbed Klose family, now officially containing Nicky, just to be thwarted by a single Neil.

When their teeth started to chatter, they put their clothes on and went back. Andrew tossed his suit jacket at Neil, whose skin was still pebbled with goosebumps as they stepped into the light, and Neil caught it and grinned and slipped it on. It didn’t fit right, yet somehow it did. Andrew looked away.

The barn was warm, the lights had dimmed down further, and sultry music was crooning from the speakers. Andrew spotted the singer from the band with a drink in his hand, a hat perched loosely on his head and his sleeves rolled up, revealing toned arms and festival bracelets. The guy noticed him looking and subtly tipped his drink at him, and Andrew felt Neil’s elbow dig into his side.

“He’s fit,” Neil teased, leaning close to murmur so only Andrew could hear. “Have you talked to him?”

“No,” Andrew said. He felt hot and shivery now, his damp clothes sticking uncomfortably to his skin.

“We chatted earlier,” Neil went on, oblivious to Andrew’s disinterest. “Want me to introduce you?”

“No,” Andrew said again.

The song changed to something louder, bolder, some kind of electro folk with brass and a stomping beat and Eastern European sounding words—Neil could probably pinpoint it if Andrew asked. Several people whooped and the dancefloor filled up some more, everyone swaying and jumping and whirling.

He leaned even closer to Neil, close enough they could smell the river water on each other’s skin.

“Dance with me.”

Neil looked surprised at the words. Andrew was, too. The guy with the hat still glanced over at him from time to time, one hand in his pocket, the other holding his drink. Andrew took Neil’s wrist and Neil found them a miraculous path through the dancers where Andrew would have resorted to force, pulling them to a stop in the heart of the writhing crowd. It was easier to move with it than stand still, easier to follow Neil’s body as it slipped seamlessly into the rhythm of the song, and suddenly they were dancing and it was sweaty and awkward and too much and too loud and somehow perfect anyway.

All around them, people were stomping and singing. Neil was still holding Andrew’s hand and used it to turn himself around, spinning away and reeling himself back in, there and gone like he always was. Andrew grabbed for something else to hold on to, to hold him close, and snagged the material of his shirt just above his hips, warm and damp and slippery.

They danced until Andrew’s head swam from the heady, intoxicating closeness and the warm air, until his hair was sweat-drenched and his limbs sluggish and Neil was swaying and laughing like he was drunk. When the music dwindled down to something softer again, they let themselves be swept toward the sides, and Andrew led Neil to the storage room with the large fridge where the extra drinks were kept cold and grabbed them two bottles of water.

After the noise of the dancefloor, the muffled music and voices and the low hum of the fridge suddenly felt like someone had stuffed his ears with cotton wool. Andrew sipped at his water, watching Neil do the same where he was leaning against the opposite wall, both taking a moment to learn how to have space between them again.

They were alone.

Neil had to hop on the train back to France in a few hours. Andrew would get on his plane at the end of the week. There were years and oceans between them already. Right here, right now was the best chance Andrew would ever get.

“I should probably start making the rounds,” Neil said, finishing his water. “Say goodbye to everyone.”

Andrew didn’t say anything. He held the cool bottle in his hand, slippery with perspiration, and watched as Neil pushed off the wall and hesitated for one, brief, glorious second.

And then he was gone.


	4. Chapter 4

“Neil, you promised.”

Neil sighed into the phone. “I did not.”

Allison made a skeptical noise. “So when you said, ‘I will be there,’ did you mean metaphorically? Because that’s some bullshit.”

“That wasn’t a promise,” Neil lied. “I say a lot of things I don’t mean.”

The phone was silent other than a tapping that he assumed was Allison’s nails against a table. “So you’re just going to abandon me to a reunion where I have to deal with both my ex and my crush? What the fuck kind of friend are you?”

“A shitty one, obviously.” Neil picked up his coffee cup only to find it empty. He cursed under his breath.

“Neil.”

He slumped back into his couch cushions. There was not a molecule in his body that wanted to move from that spot. Maybe he just—wouldn’t. Maybe if he just sat here, the couch fibers would leach into him like minerals into old bones, and he would turn into a fabric fossil and be a miracle of science.

“You haven’t seen anybody since Nicky’s wedding,” Allison said, her voice suddenly gentle. “Now you’re back, you’re only a couple of hours away from campus—”

“Three.”

“Three hours away, fine, whatever.” He could practically hear her eye roll through the phone. “I know you miss us.”

The thing was—he did. The thing was, there was something that had been slowly carved out of him, bit by bit, in the shape of them all over the past years, time eroding pieces of him away like water against rock. An Allison piece. A Matt piece. A Dan piece, a Kevin piece, a Renee piece, a Jeremy piece.

An Andrew piece. That was the one he didn’t dare look at, the one that echoed like a cave.

He had tried to fill the gaps, with numbers and math, with music, with people who seemed like they might be the right shape but always ended up being just a little bit off, a jigsaw piece from the wrong puzzle. By all appearances, he had built a good life: a little house of his own, a job, a piano he’d had shipped from France when he’d taken this job. He got dinner with his new coworkers on Thursdays. Piano lessons on Sundays. It was all fine.

Which was why this ache didn’t matter. He could live with this, it wasn’t a vital wound.

“Everyone’s going to be there.”

Neil almost started; he had forgotten he was still holding his phone to his ear. “Not everyone.”

“Everyone but Nicky, if I have to drive to fucking Atlanta to get you myself.”

He snorted, and something fragile inside him cracked, leaching warmth into his bloodstream. “You’d do that?”

“Well, no, I would fly there and then make you drive me to the reunion.”

“My car is boring. Definitely not up to your standards.”

“I don’t care. I’ll ride in your shitty Honda or whatever, and I’ll only mock you a little bit. You’re coming, Josten.”

A smile stole across his face. “Fine. I’m coming.”

* * *

Neil walked into the milling mass of people with his skin already feeling scraped raw. True to her word, Allison had appeared at his door the night before, in oversized sunglasses with a garment bag thrown over her shoulder. He hadn’t been able to help his grin at her assumption that he still didn’t know how to dress himself, and they'd had an evening of laughter and good takeout and wine. She'd fallen asleep on the couch, mumbling something about cats, and he had draped a blanket over her and gone to bed.

He didn’t know why the sight of the campus grated on him like sandpaper. Early summer flowers rioted along the sidewalks, and orange and white banners fluttered overhead. It was all achingly familiar, and he swallowed down the hollowness that stung like bile.

Then it was into the fray, people shaking hands and smiling like they knew him, small wailing children being soothed or scolded by their haggard parents, noise and colors and the distinctive smell of sun-warmed skin. So he did what he always did. He shoved that skin-crawly feeling that came with being surrounded into the vault he kept ready for that purpose, and slipped on the mask of Public Neil. The one who smiled and laughed and made small talk and definitely was not imagining taking the closest bus to a different state at all times. The one that had made it easy to glide from place to place, country to country; that had won him fake friends and free food and more undesired invitations to bed than he could count. The one he had worn for so many years that he had almost forgotten how to take it off.

“Why am I here?” he muttered at Allison, after he had finally shaken off someone who claimed to have been in his linear algebra class.

“Because despite all appearances, you are actually a good friend,” she said, draping her arm over his shoulders.

“Ugh. I should have blocked you while I had the chance.”

“Too late, I know where you live.”

He shoved her off as she messed up his hair, laughing, and then he saw them, over by the man-made pond.

Matt was standing at the edge of the water, gesticulating in the vicinity of the football stadium, free arm wrapped around Dan. Kevin and Seth were shoulder to shoulder a few feet away, clearly arguing with Matt just for the sake of it, for the sheer joy that came from the verbal battle that would never turn sharp, never make them bleed. Jeremy was laughing, egging them on. Next to them was a dark-haired woman he didn’t recognize at first, watching with a serene smile on her lips; it was that smile that gave Renee away, even before Allison brushed past him to run over to her. And sitting on the grass, staring at the obese ducks floating hopefully nearby, was Andrew.

Neil walked over slowly, resisting the rip current that pulled him in until it finally broke over him, swallowing him up in a wave of laughter and hands clapped on shoulders, fingers ruffled through hair. The familiar voices surrounded him, buffeting at his mask until he felt it crack.

He made it through the gauntlet and out the other side, laughter escaping from his lungs as he collapsed next to Andrew. A few of the ducks gave offended flaps of their wings, and Andrew raised an unimpressed eyebrow down at him where he sprawled out on the grass.

Neil wanted to reach out and touch that eyebrow, trace it with his fingers. Maybe bury his hand in his hair, which looked softer today, less style-perfect and more Andrew-perfect. It reminded him of Sunday mornings in the dorms, when they would sit in the beanbags and drink shitty coffee, Andrew’s hands sweater paws against the chill. Sometimes they would watch cartoons, sometimes Andrew would read and Neil would sketch, sometimes they would talk about nothing and anything for hours, until the others shuffled out of their beds and the quiet stillness was shattered.

He tucked his hands behind his head, the impulse with it, and squinted up at the blue blue sky, eyes stinging at the brightness of it. “I didn’t think you would come,” he told the wispy excuse of a cloud that drifted overhead.

Andrew tossed a dandelion head at him, bouncing it off his cheek. “You’re the one who was four thousand miles away.”

“Not anymore.”

Andrew hummed. “Get kicked out for bad behavior?”

Neil twisted his head to look at Andrew, who was resolutely gazing out across the water, though there was a tiny piece of laughter lurking in his eyes. “Of France? That would take some doing.”

“I’m sure you could find a way.”

“Well, I could, if I wanted to. But I like keeping my options open.”

That eyebrow went up again, and Andrew glanced at him, and Neil wanted to shove his face away but he was just out of reach. “Where’s your doppelgänger?”

“Working.”

“Lucky.”

Andrew swallowed his laugh, a little huff of breath. “Good to know you think so highly of us.”

Neil just tapped his foot against Andrew’s. He’d never needed to explain, not with Andrew.

“Stop your weird flirting, you assholes,” Allison called. “We’ve got tours to go on.”

Neil’s face heated, and he tried to swallow it down, as if that had ever worked before. But when he scrambled to his feet, he caught a hint of pink along the tips of Andrew’s ears, and he couldn’t quite suppress a grin as he held out a hand to help Andrew up.

“Fuck you,” Andrew said, but he took the offer anyway.

It was better then. The campus, the reunion, the crowds, all of it. With Matt and Seth and Jeremy shoving each other up ahead, Dan and Kevin rolling their eyes, Allison beaming like the sun with her arm looped through Renee’s, and Andrew quiet and steady at his side.

The afternoon passed on swift wings, darting and swirling with laughter and stories and inside jokes Neil had almost forgotten. The sun was taking a leisurely dip towards the horizon, staining the sky pinks and oranges that bled into the blue like watercolors applied with a careless brush, when they stopped at the entrance of their old dorm. Fox Hall was exactly as it had always been: six stories of brick and concrete shaped like a U, the west entrance propped open with what was probably the same rock they had used a decade ago.

Jeremy whooped and ran for the door, shoving it wide and racing up the stairwell. Neil laughed and chased after him, his feet remembering the steps without any input from his brain. He caught him on the last flight, pushing past him to reach the door at the top, panting and triumphant.

“Jesus fuck, Neil,” Jeremy wheezed. “How are you still so fast?”

“I’m not. You just got slow.”

They shoved through the door and onto the roof. The black tarpaper had been replaced by something different, something white and plasticky. Neil almost missed the shock of heat that would usually punch him in the face up here. But the view was the same, the gentle rolling hills with their garnishing of buildings, carefully managed trees, splashes of color amidst the green that he knew were flower beds and bushes.

More feet sounded across the roof, and he didn’t bother to look when he felt someone come up next to him. He knew it was Andrew, just in the way his edges fit up against Neil’s.

“You know what this needs?” Dan said behind them. He turned around to see her brandishing the backpack she used like a purse. “Booze.”

But it wasn’t just a bottle of wine that she pulled out of there. She had packed food for all of them, sandwiches and a bag of chips and apples and bananas. Renee slipped downstairs for a few minutes, reappearing with bottles of water that she handed out, still chilled from the vending machine. Neil gulped half of his down, then joined the circle of the rest of them in the scant shade from the stairwell.

“God, Dan, you’re such a _mom_ ,” Seth teased, grabbing a sandwich from the selection.

“And you’re a dick,” Allison said, inspecting her nails.

Renee nudged her with her knee; Allison looked up at the tight faces around her and sighed. “And dicks have a valuable role to play in the ecosystem. I guess.”

Laughter erupted, and some tiny knot deep in Neil’s chest unfolded, something that had been present for so long he hadn’t even felt it anymore. A smile crawled across his lips, and he let himself be pulled by the magnet that was Andrew, until he leaned against him, shoulder to shoulder. Andrew pushed back, the warm light from the setting sun melting his eyes into honey. They ate, and Andrew drank his little dixie cup of wine, and though Neil only had water he still felt a buzzing stealing through his bloodstream like alcohol.

The conversation rose around them. Neil dipped in and out of the pool of words, marveling at the ease of it. It had been so long since he had felt it, this cocoon of being enough, just as he was.

Eventually someone brought out their phone and turned on some music, and Allison got to her feet, pulling Renee after her to dance. Matt and Dan joined in, then Jeremy turned puppy eyes on Kevin and he grumbled but followed, the light in his eyes belying his irritation. Seth watched for a while, arms dangling off his knees, before turning a questioning look on Neil. Neil shook his head, pressing harder against Andrew, and Seth rolled his eyes at the pair of them before joining in with Matt and Dan.

“I miss this,” he said into the darkening sky. Andrew was silent, but the silence was understanding. “I thought you were done with all of us, after the wedding.”

“I thought I was too.”

Neil huffed. “What changed your mind?”

Andrew’s fingers toyed with his little paper cup, the inside still stained purple. “I got tired.”

The words were quiet, as rough as asphalt. The last few remnants of Neil’s shell were scraped away against them, and he felt naked, exposed up on that rooftop to the moon and the stars and the cool night wind. “I know what you mean.”

“Hey, Andrew!” Seth stopped in front of them, arms crossed in front of his chest. “What the fuck is this Renee is telling me? You’re going to law school?”

Andrew looked up at him impassively. “That’s a nasty rumor.”

“It’s not a rumor if it’s true, asshole.”

Andrew shrugged, and Neil let himself follow the motion. “Rumors can be true.”

“I can’t fucking believe it.” Seth reached down to hover his fist in front of Andrew’s face. Andrew stared at it for a moment, before bumping his own knuckles against Seth’s. “Our very own monster, making it real. A boyfriend and law school.” He shook his head and laughed, turning back to the others. “Go figure.”

Everything stopped. The music and the moon and the stars all went silent and still. Allison was staring at him, biting her lip, sympathy written all over her face, and he didn’t know how she knew, but she always knew. The others hadn’t noticed, they kept dancing into the summer night, and Neil forced himself to draw a steady breath.

“Law school?” His voice cracked on the other word, the one he couldn’t quite say, and he cleared the rawness from his throat. “That’s great, Andrew. I’m happy for you.”

Andrew’s shoulders were tense, and Neil rocked against him gently until he started to relax. “It’s just a thing I’m doing because Aaron felt guilty.”

“You can’t bullshit a bullshitter. You’ve wanted this for years. I remember.”

He could hear the click of Andrew’s swallow. “Do you?”

“I always have.”

The music swelled around them again, and the clouds drifted across the moon, and across the roof Allison pulled Renee close. Neil closed his eyes and counted, ticking off each of his friends, everything that mattered, everything that kept him anchored to this world.


	5. Chapter 5

Andrew was tired.

So, when he got home from work that night, bag too heavy with things he’d read already and things he hadn’t read yet, and gaze a drop further down than usual as he hung his keys up, he broke up with Cameron.

Cameron was irritated. He yelled, and Andrew smoked, and then he went quiet, and Andrew said something unpleasant, and then he left.

And Andrew sat down on his sofa, and stubbed out his third cigarette, and fell asleep.

-

The problem with being a lawyer was the fundamental lack of time it afforded Andrew. He couldn’t sleep for days, couldn’t take time off, couldn’t afford time to breathe. Not if he wanted to  _ make it _ .

That had been one of Cameron’s criticisms. Not working hard enough. Not wanting to  _ make it _ . Not caring enough about anything. Including him.

Andrew called in sick. Fuck Cameron.

-

“Andrew?”

“Hello Renee.”

“How are you?”

“Fantastic.” Andrew blew out smoke, intending to fill the living room with the stuff until the haze rubbed out the memory of Cameron entirely.

“Are you home?”

“How do you always know?” He could hear Renee smiling. But she didn’t speak. She waited. She was always waiting for him. Sometimes he wanted to push and push at her until she gave up. Sometimes he did. “I broke up with him.”

Silence, and then a heavy sigh. “Oh thank God.”

“Heathen.”

He heard Renee shout something, and then Allison’s voice came through, loud and clear, “Finally.”

“I don’t remember asking for you.”

“You never have to, sweet stuff,” Allison said, and Andrew could hear her and Renee moving around. “We’re coming over.”

“Don’t.”

There was rustling, and then Renee said, “Come away with us this weekend, then.”

“Where to?”

He heard Allison yell, “ _ No one believes that act anymore, what are they still 18?” _ and, over it, Renee patiently reminding him about the invitation they’d received out of the blue to visit Neil in Atlanta.

That Allison and Renee had received.

Andrew said, “I don’t want to crash.”

“Kevin is going to be there.”

Andrew didn’t know that. “Since when?” he asked, already standing up and brushing toast crumbs off his sleep shirt and staring critically at his bare legs.

“ _ Since Kevin decided to be a jealous, prissy, ‘Neil’s my best friend and no one else’s’-” _

“It came up.” Renee had a smile in her voice that coiled Andrew’s insides, that made him not want to go, a weekend where Renee would be smiling at Allison and Kevin would be doing his not-smiling laser focus on Neil and Andrew would be - where. Here?

He looked around at the empty apartment.

“I’m bringing Aaron.”

The phone switched around again, and Allison said, “Oh my god you dramatic, self-centred -” and Andrew hung up.

-

Aaron said, “I’m bringing Katelyn.”

Katelyn raised an eyebrow at him, and gestured behind them in their small front doorway. “And your  _ children _ ?”

Aaron glared at her. “Yes,” he spat. And then she gave him a look, and his face softened, and his body tightened, and he titled his head, and said, “If I have to.”

Andrew sighed, and rubbed his forehead. “Sure, Aaron, if you have to.”

Aaron looked surprised, like there had to be something unpleasant to follow. Andrew was tired, barely washed, hopeful he had packed socks, itching to get on the road. He supposed he couldn’t blame his brother for his bad mood. He had never liked to announce himself beforehand.

“Go,” Katelyn said, and added, “If you want to. I don’t mind.”

Aaron looked at her, and then back at Andrew, then slammed the door in his face.

It took three cigarettes, leaning against his car, for Aaron to reappear, bag in his hand and expression tight and tired.

Andrew got in the car without a word, and Aaron did too, and it wasn’t until an hour on the road that he asked, “Why are we going to this again?”

Andrew didn’t want to say,  _ because I’m tired _ , because it sounded pathetic, even to him, and he didn’t want to say,  _ I broke up with Cameron _ , because even someone as narrow-minded as Aaron would see a link there in a heartbeat, so he said, drily, “Southern hospitality.”

Aaron huffed out a laugh, turned the radio on, relaxed into his seat, and was asleep within minutes.

-

It was a seven hour drive, and they arrived at two in the morning. Andrew had directions from Renee on his phone, and a single text from Neil which read,  _ I heard you’re bringing Aaron. Dick.  _ which, after its umpteenth read, still made the edge of Andrew’s mouth curve up.

He pulled up and turned off his car outside the small house that Renee had told him was Neil’s, and shoved Aaron once in the shoulder, pushing his brother’s sleeping form into the window. Aaron jolted upright and said, “I’m awake.”

“Yes,” said Andrew, and got out the car.

“Wait,” said Aaron, following him out and looking blearily at him over the top of the car, trying to maintain a disapproving expression through a yawn. “Where are we staying.”

Andrew didn’t answer, didn’t get his bags, didn’t lock his car. He walked up to the front door. He didn’t have to double check the number. He rang the doorbell once, twice, three times, four times - 

And a sleep-rumpled Neil appeared, a wary smile on his face. “Asshole,” he said.

Andrew flicked his eyes over Neil’s face, half-dark and a little older since the years they’d last seen each other, and said, “You got room for two more?”

Neil shook his head, and grinned, and stepped into the moonlight - all boxers and too-big black shirt - and moved his hand into the space between them - and then stopped, and let it drop, and, smile a little less bright, said, “Sure. Renee and Allison got a hotel. Only Kevin’s staying here. And he arrived at a  _ civilised hour. _ ”

“No Jeremy?” asked Andrew, swallowing something down as he shoved his hands in his pockets, not watching Neil’s linger at his sides, and heard Aaron appear behind him.

“Keys,” Aaron said, and Andrew, instead of giving them up, turned away to lock the car.

When he stepped inside, it was to an open plan living room/kitchen/hallway/staircase. Neil was gesturing at the sofa. “Kevin’s in the spare room. Sorry.”

Aaron flicked a look at Andrew. “Sofa or floor?”

He meant himself, and Andrew felt irritated by the suggestion. Or bored. It was too late to be dissecting anything right now. “I’ll sleep on the floor,” he said, and Aaron shrugged in agreement.

Aaron was shown the way to the upstairs bathroom, and Andrew heard him open a door and yell, “GOOD MORNING,” before hearing a loud thump on the ceiling and Aaron’s cackle floating down the stairs. Neil shook his head at Andrew, and started pulling blankets out of a cupboard.

He had a lot of blankets.

“Why do you have so many blankets?” Andrew asked as Neil started arranging him a nest on the floor. “You live in Atlanta.”

“What if I knew you would need them one day,” Neil said, a small smile appearing.

Andrew looked away. “I don’t need -”

“Sure,” Neil interrupted, still arranging. He took one of the cushions off the back of the sofa and made Andrew a pillow. He opened his arms wide. “Tada.”

Andrew eyed the sofa, regretting his decisions. “So, he said, toeing off his shoes and unzipping his hoody. “No Jeremy.”

Neil looked away, busying himself with arranging a single blanket for Aaron on the sofa. Still standing there in his boxers, like he had no idea it was a problem for anyone. “No Jeremy. I don’t know. Something to do with Alice.”

Andrew shook his head. “Kids.”

“Yeh.”

Then they were silent for a while. Then Aaron appeared, and Andrew went in search of the bathroom, stopping to punch a nearly-back-to-sleep Kevin on the shoulder, and by the time he was back downstairs, the lights were off, his brother was stretching out on the sofa, and Neil had disappeared.

-

Revenge started early, with Kevin and Neil waking them loudly before leaving for a run, and, feeling like only minutes later, reappearing loudly, with loud breakfast, and open curtains, and bright, and  _ loud _ .

Andrew said so, and Neil threw a cushion at him.

The four of them ate on the floor of the living room, and it was like no time had passed at all.

Kevin took a photo with him doing the peace sign and Neil’s eyebrows high and Andrew and Aaron not looking at the camera at all, and sent it to Nicky, and Andrew didn’t say anything at all, and Aaron looked at him afterwards, and said, “Sap.”

Andrew stole the last bite of his waffle.

-

They met up with Allison and Renee, and Andrew stood to the side of the hugs despite the reunion they’d all had the day before, and caught up with Renee while Neil and Allison led them around, Kevin and Aaron trailing behind.

It wasn’t awful.

Andrew thought about Cameron, once. Had a message.  _ Picking up my stuff. _

_ Go nuts. I’m not there. _

_ Where are you? _

He didn’t reply.

Renee touched his arm at one point, and he shrugged, and she told the others to go ahead. They walked, Renee’s arm through his, around the park across the road, and Renee asked, “What finally triggered it?”

Andrew watched soft dewy grass curl around his boots. “I realised I didn’t want it,” is all he said.

Renee nodded, and tightened her hand over his arm. Andrew squeezed her back. She said, “I thought you’d realised that a long time ago.”

Andrew said, “I realised he didn’t want it.”

“Well we knew that already,” Renee said darkly.

Andrew ran his fingers across his mouth. “He did not like me much. I’m surprised he stayed so long.”

“Why did you let him.”

Andrew shrugged. “What else is there to do.”

They found a bench and spread out along it, and when the others appeared, handing Andrew and Renee sandwiches, scattering along the grass at their feet, Andrew found himself sliding off to sit cross-legged next to Neil, waiting until the others were in a heated debate about nothing at all to say, quietly, “Been a while.”

Neil swallowed down a bite, and gave him a look. “You too. Been busy?” Andrew watched his face, trying to find bitterness, seeing nothing but blank, dull, hidden. Seeing nothing at all. Neil frowned at him. “What?”

Andrew met his gaze and said quietly, “I can’t read you anymore.”

That cleared it. Something in Neil’s expression lightened, and then darkened, all at once. He looked down at his sandwich, shrugged, and smiled at it. “Been a while,” he echoed.

Andrew wondered if he was supposed to apologise. What was the point? “How’s Atlanta?”

Neil directed his smile at Andrew and talked about his work, how he was now translating for a charity that dealt with child trafficking, how he finally felt like he’d found something he could do for a while, how he felt ok here. Andrew asked about friends, and Neil shrugged, and he was about to press when Neil shot him a glance and said, “And how’s - I’m sorry, I can’t remember his name.”

It sounded genuine, none of the bitterness that would have laced the words had their situations been swapped. Andrew said, “Cameron.”

“Right. You didn’t bring him?”

Of course he hadn’t brought him. He would never have brought him. Here? To Neil? Andrew pulled another bite off his sandwich and popped it in his mouth. Through chewing he said, “No.”

And perhaps Neil heard the real  _ no,  _ because he nodded, said, “Ok,” and rose to his feet, throwing a ball of wrappers in a nearby trash can, and grabbing Allison and Kevin by their sleeves. “I’m bored,” he said. “Who brought a ball?”

Kevin produced a tennis ball from his pocket, and Aaron and Renee got up too, and they tossed the ball around for a while, and Andrew lay on his back, and watched the clouds, and tried his best not to feel anything, and put a hand over his eyes, and counted as high as he could, and dozed off.

-

Andrew and Aaron were heading back the next day. Andrew had work on Monday, and an empty apartment, and bills to separate, and Aaron had the hospital, and Katelyn, and his children, and a whole world.

So they went out drinking.

Neil took them to a cocktail bar and let Andrew order him increasingly ridiculously named things, in oranges and pinks and blues, and sometimes they shared, and Neil let him sit nearby, and Andrew tried to pretend ten years hadn’t passed since college.

Kevin said, “Neil,” with determination, and Andrew almost smiled at the nostalgia, and Kevin said, “When are you moving back.”

Neil looked at him, patient. “I’m not,” he said.

Allison pouted. “We need you. Atlanta is so far.”

“You guys don’t even live in the same place anymore.”

“So?” Allison said, dragging an arm around Renee. “We use this thing called  _ planes,  _ Neil. Anyway, you’re the furthest. Andrew only moved an hour from school then went back again.”

“Let’s not use  _ Minyards  _ as a measure of success,” Aaron said.

“Oh yes, a lawyer and a doctor, like your mother would have been so unimpressed,” Allison said. She softened it with a wink, and Aaron actually smiled at her. Andrew took Neil’s shot from him and downed it.

They talked about everything and nothing, and Andrew listened, and watched the table, and chimed in when he could, and thought about Cameron, and watched the side of Neil’s face, and stood abruptly and said, “I’m going for a smoke.”

“Andrew!” said Kevin, pointing at him. “You quit years ago.”

“It’s an expression,” said Andrew, shoving his hands in his pockets and walking away from the table.

Outside, the air was cool, the cars were loud, and he walked until he found an alley round the corner. There was a stench of sweat and alcohol and Andrew breathed it all in until everything else was just memory.

Neil said, “What’s up?”

Andrew opened his eyes to see Neil standing a few feet away, at the entrance of the alley, lit up from behind by street lights and headlights and -

“What’s up,” he repeated.

Neil smirked. “I can still read you.”

He could. It pissed him off. Andrew shrugged, and Neil hesitated, and then stepped into the alley. He laughed. “I think I’m drunk.”

“No shit.”

Neil was grinning at him, a little sloppy, like his mouth didn’t know what it was doing, then leaned against the wall next to him. “I haven’t been drunk since - since the last time I saw you guys.”

They were quiet, then, and Andrew wished he had a cigarette. Wished and wished and wondered if he took his hand out of his pocket he’d see a pack there, and light one for Neil, maybe breathe into his mouth -

“Why did you come?”

Neil’s words pierced through his thoughts, and it was late, and Andrew was tired, and on the edge of drunk, and he felt old, in this moment, standing outside a bar, wanting things he couldn’t have, and he didn’t have time to filter anything as he said, “I came to see you.”

When he looked at Neil, his smile had gone, and he was assessing Andrew, and said, “Well - yeah.” But he looked different, like he knew, and maybe he had always known, and maybe this was all Andrew needed to get over it.

So he said, “I just feel done, Neil.” And, slower, quieter, “This was never going to happen, was it.”

Neil blinked, and then fury spread across his face, and he said, “Excuse me?”

Andrew tried to read him for the fury, tried to go back over his words to see where it had come from, and found nothing. He straightened. “What?”

“I - you -” Neil spluttered, and pushed off from the wall, and said, “I’ve been  _ here _ , Andrew. What do you mean never going to happen. You have a  _ boyfriend _ . I’ve been here, and you have a boyfriend -”

Andrew frowned. “No I don’t. Wait - you mean Cameron?”

Neil’s eyes widened, and said, “You are unbelievable.”

“He’s not my boyfriend.”

But Neil was already walking away.

“Why are you angry,” Andrew asked, feeling a little desperate.

Neil turned back, and walked right up to Andrew, and when he spoke it was quiet, and made Andrew’s heart beat. He said, “Never going to happen? Why do you think I came back?”

Neil’s face was shaded, silhouetted by the lights behind him and the shadow surrounding Andrew, and Andrew knew, part of him knew, that  _ this  _ having never happened was never for lack of wanting, for either of them, but it had just never - somehow - “It would never have worked,” Andrew said slowly, testing out the words.

“Maybe,” Neil said, matching his volume, sighing and anger fading and eyes darting all over his face. “Or maybe we didn’t try hard enough.”

Andrew drew a hand up to his cheek, and watched Neil’s eyes widen, and said, “Can I?” Touching him. Watching his own hand.

And Neil took in a breath, and brought his hand up to Andrew’s, and kissed him.

Once. It was almost more painful than no kiss at all, Neil’s lips touching his for the first time, and Andrew’s chasing after him, and Neil whispering into the space between them, “I’ve been here all this fucking time,” before leaving him alone in the alley.

-

Andrew went inside, and found Renee, and Renee’s mouth dropped open and, in an uncharacteristic wave of enthusiastic energy she said, “But you’re not with Cameron anymore!”

And Andrew looked away. “Yeah. Do you suppose I should tell him that?”

“Why on earth wouldn’t you?”

And they got a cab back to Neil’s, and Allison and Renee gave Andrew significant looks as they parted ways, and Andrew said to Neil, “Can we talk,” and led him out back.

“I just think,” Neil said, words leaving his mouth with the speed of someone who had downed several more shots after their last conversation several hours ago, “That I need to let this go. I’ve been letting it go. I wasn’t going to say anything. I would never ruin anything you’ve built for yourself.”

They were sat on the porch steps of Neil’s tiny house, a wooden fence crowding around the edge of his small patch of grass. Andrew watched peeling away white paint on the furthest patch of wall and said, “I never asked you to let this go.”

He felt Neil look at him. “But Cameron?”

Andrew took in a deep breath, and said, “We broke up.”

Neil was silent. “Oh.” And then. “When?”

Andrew didn’t answer.

“Why?”

Andrew said, “He did not like me much. I wasn’t really in it. Do we have to have this conversation?”

Neil huffed from beside him. “We don’t  _ have  _ to do anything.”

And Andrew looked at Neil’s feet, socked and dappled in moonlight, and said, quietly, “He wasn’t you, Neil.” And added, “Nothing ever was.”

After a moment he felt Neil’s head drop to his shoulder, and Neil took a deep breath in against him and said, pained, “Why didn’t you  _ say  _ anything.”

Andrew frowned at the mop of hair facing him and said, “You didn’t either.”

“I thought it was understood.”

“What?”

“That it wasn’t -”

Andrew waited.

“Wasn’t what,” he asked quietly, lifting a hand now and pushing his fingers through Neil’s hair, and with it Neil’s head rose, and they were close now, as close as earlier, or perhaps closer, something clicking in Andrew now that he’d wanted Neil for years, forever, had never understood before with quite the same urgency what he’d wanted.

What he’d never had with Cameron.

Neil took in a sharp breath, and said, “I didn’t think - part of me wondered if either of us could do this.”

Andrew looked up at the night sky, eyes tracing familiar constellations, and said, “Have you had partners?”

He knew Neil was shaking his head, didn’t expect him to offer more. But Neil said, “Not after Sarah. It just never felt right. Was that what it was like with Cameron?”

They were sitting so close Andrew thought it was a marvel he was still breathing, was still at all, and then Neil inched even closer, so now their legs were touching, and Neil was warm beside him, and closer than he’d been in years, and Andrew closed his eyes, “Yes,” not knowing what question he was answering really, but perhaps Neil knew, Neil always seemed to know, and then he felt Neil’s breath on his face, and then they were kissing, again. And oh, Andrew brought up his hand, and Neil did too; they turned towards each other, like they’d been doing for years, and why hadn’t they done this  _ earlier _ , would doing it and not getting to keep it have been more painful? Andrew couldn’t see how, with Neil’s lips finally beneath his, speaking into each other words they had never been able to give to anyone else.

Neil said, “Andrew,” sounding broken already, “I think I -” 

and Andrew said, “No more talking,” and pressed him back, back to concrete, Neil’s hands to Andrew’s back, pulling him even closer.

And time passed. Perhaps life so far had been preparing him for this, had passed by in a painful drawn out second, so that he could live inside this, on top of Neil, kissing him the gentlest he’d ever kissed anyone.

Neil breathed in, ragged, at one point and said, “Maybe we should, stop,” and Andrew backed off quickly, and ran a hand through his hair, and closed his eyes, no air in his lungs and Neil’s taste on his lips.

He said, “Yes, ok,” and cleared his throat, feeling like a teenager. “Perhaps making out, drunk, in the middle of the night, with our entire family inside is not the best way to start things.”

He thought Neil would laugh, but when he turned to look at him, t-shirt rucked off his shoulder and hair all over the place, Neil just looked serious. “What are we starting, exactly?”

And Andrew looked away.

And Neil said, “When did you and Cameron end things?”

Andrew put a hand in his pocket. He had no cigarettes. “Recently.”

“How recently?”

Andrew tapped a finger against his thigh. “I suppose, give or take time zones. Yesterday.”

“We’re in the same -  _ yesterday? _ ”

Andrew looked at him at the moment Neil looked away, at the moment he lay his arms over his knees and tilted his head to the sky. “Yesterday,” he said again.

“Yes,” said Andrew, and then turned more towards him. “Is that a problem?”

Neil just kept looking at the sky, so Andrew looked too, wanting to ask about them, whether Neil ever lay down at night and just watched the stars, whether he thought of Andrew when he did, whether he ever thought of Andrew. And then Neil said. “I don’t know. I don’t want to be -”

“My  _ constellation _ ?” Andrew joked.

Neil looked at him, and almost smiled, but just said, “Well, yeah. Your consolation. That’s not what this can be. This can’t just be sex.”

Andrew raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t realise this even was sex.”

“You know what I mean.”

He did. Andrew knew what he meant, and didn’t have any words of solace.

Neil said, “I just think, if we’re going to do this - I don’t want it - I mean, yesterday. You ended a long-term relationship  _ yesterday  _ and you haven’t told me why - I’m not the reason, am I?”

Andrew shook his head, “No,” not knowing how much of a lie it was, “There were lots of reasons.”

Neil stared at his feet, moving his toes up and down. “Name some.”

“He was kind of an asshole.” Neil hummed. “Renee hated him.” Neil nodded, and looked up, staring at the fence. “It was passing time. For both of us.” Andrew looked away too, and waited for the judgement he knew was coming, knew from the moment Neil had looked away from him.

“I think we need to take some time. To work out what we want.”

Andrew almost growled in frustration. “We have had nothing  _ but  _ time.”

Neil shrugged. “I’m not going to be a rebound.”

Andrew stood up, and Neil looked up at him. Andrew assessed his face, and nodded, and tucked his emotions away again, and said, “Then I’m not going to be your excuse any longer. You want to be unhappy? Fine. I hate this state anyway.”

Neil smiled. “So do I.”

And Andrew rolled his eyes, and let Neil stand up and kiss him, and didn’t reach out to hold him, didn’t make him stay, didn’t protest, and let him go inside first, and stood still for a long time afterwards.


	6. Chapter 6

Normally, within a few weeks of seeing his college friends, Neil was able to shake the feeling that he was missing something. Plunged back into his life. He _had_ friends. He’s had relationships. A couple of times. Before giving up entirely, having never really understood the appeal. He loved his job—sometimes. Loved it when he could get stuck into it with a single-mindedness that blurred the rest of the day out. So there was that. His work colleagues/friends?/whatever sometimes talked about their college days with a distance he felt he should be striving to have. He would nod when they joked about how _young_ they all were back then, as if ten odd years was a lifetime, as if they understood the value of the people he met then and how that must have faded with time.

He called Kevin, at 3pm on a Tuesday, and Kevin answered with a, “Well this didn’t take long.”

Neil blinked at the page in front of him, reading over the last sentence. “What didn’t?”

“We saw each other a week ago.” Neil looked up at the calendar he taped on the wall above his computer. “It normally takes months for you to miss me.”

“I don’t miss you.”

“Sure. What do you want? I’m busy.”

“Rude.” Neil leaned back in his chair, smiling. “I just wanted to chat.”

“We have never, in the history of ever, just chatted. What’s wrong?”

Neil twirled his pen between his fingers. “How’s Jeremy?”

“The same as he was a week ago. Frazzled. Ridiculous. Listen, it was good to talk but I’ve got to—”

“How’s Andrew?”

Kevin paused before answering, “What the fuck did you do.”

Neil frowned at Kevin. “What makes you think I did anything? I don’t do anything. I didn’t do anything.” And then added, “Maybe _he_ did something.”

“Did he?”

“No,” Neil lied, doodling a fox paw in the margins of his translation notes.

“Wait a second.” Kevin’s voice grew distance as he yelled, “Just a minute, Neil’s on the phone. What? No idea.” Then he reappears and says, “Why did you call, Neil? To ask how a mutual friend we both saw a week ago is doing?”

Neil hummed. Scribbled out the fox paw.

“Jesus Christ,” Kevin said, and hung up on him.

* * *

Neil wanted to text Andrew. Just a message. He didn’t know what to say, though. So he messaged Nicky instead.

_Hello_

**_Neil! My man. It’s been a while_ **

_Sure_

_How are you_

**_I’m ok_ **

Nicky replied, and followed with five minutes of detailed life updates about Erik, Germany, the adoption process, Erik’s cousin’s wedding which really did sound like a debacle, and to which Neil for some reason had been invited.

Eventually Neil said

_Listen_

**_??_**

_How’s Andrew_

**_… OH MY GOD_ **

_?_

**_Did something finally happen??_ **

_Oh_

_No_

_No, it’s just, I know he broke up with Cameron, so. I was just wondering if he was ok._

**_OH MY GOD_ **

_Ok never mind_

**_No no_ **

**_Absolutely not_ **

**_Tell me everything_ **

**_…_ **

**_Fine tell me nothing you asshole_ **

**_Can i help_ **

**_What’s happening_ **

**_Is anything happening?_ **

Neil turned his phone off.

* * *

They all lived in different places. Nicky was in Germany and Kevin and Jeremy ended up in New York, but the others all spread out around where they went to college—South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia.

It was all _doable_.

But Allison was right. Neil didn’t really ever go to visit them.

He was never very good at having friends.

Had never figured out how to be more to Andrew.

* * *

Neil was bored, at work, fidgeting, glancing at the calendar every minute and keeping his phone charged for some reason, and ignoring an insistent buzzing at the back of his mind that he’d got something wrong, and got stuck into translating a 30 page policy document.

He was half a page in when he scrolled onto the charity’s news page instead.

Which is where he saw the job.

* * *

Neil called Allison. “Honeybun,” Allison replied.

“Hey,” said Neil, already writing an email to his boss that he was going home sick. “What are you doing?”

“Right now? I’m at work. Like normal people.”

“I mean tonight?”

“Tonight? Well wouldn’t you know it’s a Friday so I’m going home to my incredibly beautiful girlfriend and giving her—”

“Listen,” Neil interrupted, hitting send on the email and standing and grabbing his coat and bag in the same motion. “I’m coming over.”

“...What do you mean?”

“Can I stay? If I come now? Is that okay?”

“Oh my god,” Allison said.

“Don’t say anything,” Neil said, pushing through the door of the building and hoping no one had seen him just walk out.

“I wouldn’t dare.”

“I’ll send you my flight details.”

“Okay. Come get him, tiger.”

* * *

Neil had intended to go straight to Allison and Renee’s apartment. It was midnight, and he was struggling through the cold to the taxi stand, but the problem was he’d asked Allison to send him Andrew’s new address—just in case—for when he needed it—and when the guy asked where he was going he blurted out Andrew’s address.

Which brought him to standing outside Andrew’s apartment in basically the middle of the night wondering whether he was brave enough to knock on the door.

 _This is stupid,_ he thought. Then knocked on the door.

Andrew appeared after not too long, and blinked at him with tiny, angry, sleep-weary eyes which paused in their blinking before widening.

Neil didn’t think he’d ever seen Andrew lost for words.

It would have been kind of fun if Neil wasn’t certain Andrew might be quite pissed at him.

“Uh,” said Neil. He gestured. “Can I come in?”

Andrew blinked some more, then held the door open a little wider.

Neil stepped in, and looked around. “Hey,” he said. “It’s nicer than your old place.”

Andrew didn’t say anything. Neil heard the door close behind him. He stepped further inside. “Nice,” he said again, and pointed at the sofa. “I like your sofa.”

“What the hell,” Andrew grumbled, walking past Neil and collapsing onto the end of it. “Did you just travel half way up the country to tell me you liked my sofa.”

Neil considered him. He was looking at Neil like he still wasn’t entirely sure this wasn’t some dream, like maybe he was still asleep in some way. He patted his chest a little, as if checking something. Neil smirked.

“Not really,” he said, sitting at the other end, tucking his legs up and facing Andrew. “I wanted to talk to you.”

Andrew shook his head in disbelief. “I was sleeping,” he said. “Maybe I still am,” he added, cocking his head.

Neil burned under his attention.

He scratched the back of his head. “I can go, if you…” he trailed off.

Andrew shook his head again. “You can stay. I might fall asleep though.” He’d never looked more awake to Neil. Neil had never _felt_ more awake. Adrenaline and the buzz of the flight and the lights and the middle of the night burned through him.

“Is this the apartment you shared with Cameron?” he blurted out.

Andrew raised his eyebrows. “Is now really the time,” he said, not sounding very friendly.

Neil said, “Yes,” and then, “It has to be now. I mean, it doesn’t have to be. I feel like it should be now, you know? Sometimes you just _know._ ”

And then Andrew relaxed, crossed his legs and crossed his arms and waited.

“Oh,” said Neil, “you want me to go first.”

“Go first,” Andrew repeated. “I did not receive an advanced copy of the agenda, so, yes, that would be helpful.” He hid a yawn behind his hand, but Neil thought it could not have been real. It could not have been. They were here, finally, weren’t they?

Neil said, “Well, I’m here because—you kissed me, and I liked it—”

“You kissed me too,” Andrew mumbled.

“Yes,” Neil agreed quickly. “And I said I thought we’d need time because—how long were you with Cameron?”

Andrew shrugged. “A few years.” Noncommittally. Looking away from Neil. Like he wasn’t sure where this was going.

Neil reached out and dug his fingers into the material of Andrew’s pyjamas, gripping, not touching his skin, and tugged. Andrew looked back at him. “Okay well,” said Neil. “I’ve had some time.”

Andrew stilled, and then sat up a little straighter, and said, “It’s been two weeks.”

Neil smirked, feeling nervous. “I tell you I know what I want and you want to argue about how quickly I got there?”

“Maybe.” And then Andrew smiled. And it just lit up everything inside Neil, and he grinned, wanting—less space between them. But knowing they had to talk.

“I hate talking,” Neil said.

“Oh good,” said Andrew, shifting forward.

“Wait,” said Neil, holding up a hand. “I wondered—would it be too much—a job came up at work. Um. There’s a new office opening here. In Richmond.” Andrew took Neil’s arm and pulled it forward. “And listen, I know it’s been a while.”

“It’s been two weeks.”

“You know what I meant.”

“Two weeks,” Andrew said again, wonderingly, eyes flicking down to Neil’s lips and back up to his eyes.

“I think I might have always loved you,” Neil said.

“Apply for the fucking job,” Andrew said, and surged forward to kiss him.

* * *

**_Epilogue_ **

Andrew straightened Neil’s tie, giving it the little pat at the end that always seemed necessary. Neil had never understood it, but neither of them felt like it was actually straight without that pat. “You ready to brave my coworkers?”

“They can’t possibly be worse than Allison,” Andrew deadpanned. The little crinkles appeared at the corners of Andrew’s eyes, and Neil stopped himself from kissing them for fear they would never actually make it into the building.

“Debatable.”

The office was covered in twinkle lights. A tall skinny tree was wedged into one corner, its branches brushing against Jean’s desk. There was a menorah on one windowsill, and stars dangling from the ceiling. Neil watched Andrew glance over all of it before squaring his shoulders and joining in the fray.

“So,” Laila said, smiling over her glass of wine. “How long have you known each other?”

“Uh.” Neil did some quick math in his head. “Fourteen years? Ish?”

“Oh my god, you’ve been together fourteen years?” her wife squealed. Neil thought her name was Sara. It might have been Samantha. Or possibly Becca. Her hair obscured everything on her nametag but the _a_. “That is the cutest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.”

“No,” Andrew said firmly. He turned to Neil. “And it’s fifteen. We met sophomore year.”

They looked at him with mirror-image confusion. Neil bit back a laugh. “We’ve known each other for fifteen years, apparently. And we moved in together. What is this, December? Eight months ago? When I started working here.”

“That’s...the reverse of us,” Laila said. “We didn’t meet until a few years ago, and then we moved in together a week later, got married the next year.”

“Well, when it’s the right time, it’s the right time, you know?” A soft smile spread across her wife’s face. “Sometimes you get lucky.”

Neil nudged Andrew with his shoulder, and received a shove back in return. He thought about waking up that morning, in the bed they shared, Andrew’s elderly bit of a cat Dustbunny snoring at the foot of the bed. About the forks in the road they had taken that had pulled them apart and somehow led them back again. “Sometimes you’re just too stupid to see it until it’s almost too late.”

Laila laughed, and Andrew’s hand found his. “Not stupid,” she admonished. “Right time, remember?”

“To right times,” her wife said, raising her glass.

The glasses clinked together, a bright sound among the hum of voices around them. He squeezed Andrew’s hand, and Andrew squeezed back.

“To right times.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading and commenting and liking and ETC! This was fun to write, lots of love to Cory on her birthday(/birthfortnight) and to all of you  
> -hedy, fuzzy & moony xxx


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